The Black Road
by DistrustfulLie
Summary: The Zone can be a lonely and dangerous place, even for the most skilled stalker. It's hard to survive alone - most stick together to increase their odds. But some wayward stalkers walk a more solitary path - the Black Road. This is their tale.
1. The Black Road

Gather round, stalkers, eat your cold beans and questionably acquired rations, and hear a few tales of adventure, a cursed family, and, of course, The Zone.

This is the dramatic retelling of my adventures in Stalker: Call of Pripyat. I am running the Misry 2.1.1 mod, which adds many features like classes, hunger, cooking, skinning, modified durability and weapon repair, weather effects, artifact interaction, guns, and other such goodies. Check it out, you won't play CoP any other way after. I am playing on master difficulty starting with the Black Road option, which restricts your initial gear to a knife, a flashlight, and a set of clamps to interact with artifacts. I am playing the Assault class, which sacrifices many noncombat stats for brawn, toughness, and stamina. Whenever I die, the story begins again from the start. Stay a while, and listen.


	2. Kubyshkin the Intensely Insane

Kubyshkin the Intensely Zany

Kubyshkin comes to in the bare remains of a nondescribt room in the pitch black of night. Swaying to his feet with a shake of the head - a futile attempt to cast off his pulsing hangover – Kubyshkin kicks aside some empty vodka bottles – the cheap shit - as he fumbles for his flashlight. He finds his knife first: a little worn with a loose handle but a sharp and dependable blade. His probing of the small space revealed little that would jog his memory, having no recollection of how he came to this place. An empty desk sat below the window. The bed with the soiled mattress was across from it. Over by the door was an empty bookcase. The glassless window framed bushes and dirt, with no landmarks but a few trees. An odd giddiness came to him at the thought of being alone, hungover in the dark in a strange cabin in the woods, so he giggled to himself and played solo pattycake in the corner. He quickly grew bored of this and escalated to carefully fingering his butthole, but he stopped, fearing his fingernails were already too filthy.

Kubyshkin stood up and wiped the shit off his thumb before deciding to finally check the other rooms. The next room had a matress-less bed frame and another empty bookcase. Moving around the corner to the next room, Kubyshkin spotted the doorway leading outside, partially blocked by crates. As he moved towards it, a figure stumbling past it raised his hackles, and he ducked back around the corner in fear. From the way he shambled and the angle of his head, he was a zombie – and not the fun roleplaying necrophiliac kind. Looking out the window, he spotted more moving zombies, and ducked down. He knew he had to come up with a plan, & fast!1!

He killed the light and moved against the crates that separated him from freedom. Seeing several zombies beyond, he leaned out to get their attention, then moved back behind cover as their inaccurate fire filled the air around his general whereabouts. As they moved closer, he stabbed his knife between the gap of the crates and doorway, making quick lunges. The first zombie fell, then the second, before the crates burst from the gunfire. The third zombie soaked up many of the fourth's bullets, but by the time the fifth came through the doorway, Kubyshkin the Intensely Zany was already dead.

The Zone has claimed another one.


	3. Uralets, Snake Preacher

Uralets, Snake Preacher

Uralets, who was Kubyshkin's brother, was a little smarter than Kubyshkin, so when he awoke, slightly less hungover, in the same situation, he climbed the ladder into the attic that Kubyshkin didn't notice. Among the crates in the attic, he found some delicious boar chops, and got a foggy view of the sawmill around him. He planned to make a break for it, but as he moved to the hole leading back down into the house, the crowd of zombies now inside the house opened fire on him, grazing his left shin. Uralets let out his version of a curse, a snake-like aggressive hissing, complete with the darting of his forked tongue, and then slithered his way to the opposite side of the attic.

Squeezing through the gap of missing wall boards, he fell to the ground facing a wire fence. He ran through a missing segment to the left and followed the fence back to the right. He was faced with open ground and freedom, with the saw mill overlooking him on a hill to the right. He paused a second, considering sprinting away with nothing but a knife, flashlight, nametag (so he didn't forget his name – he was still pretty stupid), and artifact handling pinchers. Deciding to risk it for the proverbial biscuit, he ran up the hill into the barn of the saw mill. Passing the warm fire and its illusion of safety, he clambered atop a tractor, spying a box which he opened.

A wealth of bounty! Welding goggles (which would help him not at all – he couldn't weld), an old hammer (his grandpa had a hammer just like it, so it must be old), a flash with .25L of Stolichnaya vodka (imported), a military battery (it seemed skilled in battlefield tactics and strategy), a broken camera (it could not take selfies), and 100 rubles. The cream of the crop was the TOZ 66 sawn-off shotgun – only two shots`, but packing a mean double-barreled look, like a bull's flaring nostrils, or the vacant eyes of his father. He named it Pelevina, after his first dog and his first girlfriend – who weren't the same, or at least as he told himself!1! (ba-dum CH)

Feeling greedy, he turned back to the house below the hill, hoping for some ammo or a sister pistol. He took a quick peak around the corner of the barn and saw two zombies, one of them two yards in front of the other, zombying their way up the hill. He waited for them to come to him, hissing slightly. He waited, tried waiting patiently, and instead waited impatiently, stealing a few more looks in order to catch their attention. One came around the corner three yards away from him, pistol already raised gangster-style. He sprinted to him and took a bullet graze to the same spot on the left shin, which hurt, before laying the zombie down with a flurry of soviet combat knife strikes, like his academy teachers taught him not to do. The next zombie a few yards away went down in a similar fashion. He gathered their guns and quickly went through their pockets, retreating back to the barn with his goods. His troubles rewarded him a worn Desert Eagle (which was empty, but made him feel a little better about his micropenis), a neglected Fort-12 (rusty, but with 8 shots), and diddly squat else.

Emboldened, Uralets continued his hunt of the zombies. The first rays of daylight reflected off the fog as he slid halfway down the hill to the cover of a tree. He saw three zombies by the house below, and two others moving down the hill to his right. He felt right at hole slitering through the filthy grass towards the closer zombie to the right in the first second, before realizing a balaclava-clad zombie was crippling towards him, firing shots! He hid, took a graze to the right shin, then hid better. A few seconds later, he whirled the other away around the tree and slashed the zombie until it fell. He gathered up its worn Walther P99 (15 bullets). The other zombies seemed not to notice.

A bit shaken, he resumed his snake-esque slithering towards the zombies. Have I mentioned he's into snakes yet? As he drew closer to the two zombies on the right, he blinked his eyes and saw that it was four zombies instead. As the closest opened fire on him, he lost his nerve and sprinted un-snakemanlike, uphill to a brick building with a massive pipe coming out of it, kind of like his outie bellybutton, but with less metal. He hyperventilated a bit behind it, then, feeling sheepish at his fear, resolved himself to kill every last zombie. Ever.

Okay, maybe not ever, but at least here. In the general vicinity. Looking back towards the barn, he saw one zombie atop the hill on the other side of the barn, wandering under the metal cover and scaffolding. He ran into the barn, and saw a different zombie already inside near the entrance across from him. He attempted to sneak around its line of sight, then failed the check as the zombie perceived him and fired The Gun. He took a bullet in the chest as he slashed desperately, then another that severed his stumpy umbilical cord, severing him from his source of power and connection to the mortal sphere. Uralets died as he lived – hissing, and aching to return to the womb.

The zone has claimed another one.


	4. Boyarov, the Questinable Tractor

Boyarov, the Questionable Tractor

Boyarcv, who was Uralet's cousin, awoke to the family curse – being drunk and waking up in a strange woodland saw mill cabin with nothing but his bathroom gear. He snuck up the ladder into the attic, swooped the fabled boar chops, and saw through the gap in the wall that there were at least three zombies by the fence below. Through the broken floor on the other side, nearest to the saw mill hill with no frill that seemed chill but was still ill, he SAW (get it?) two zombies in the driveway. To the left, three more zombies between him and the freedom-promising open ground. He felt trapped in the attic, like that time he was trapped in the attic with his strange Uncle of the vacant eyes.

He moved back to the gap and saw only two zombies, so he dropped to the floor. He ran to one of the zombies, hoping to take him down swiftly. The third additional zombie beyond him frightened him almost as much as the bullets in his gut. He tried to push past the zombie through a gap in the gate and to freedom, but like that time in the attic with his strange Uncle of the vacant eyes, he was powerless to resist and fell to the ground crying and bleeding.

And I didn't even get to explain the tractor part.

The Zone has claimed another.


	5. Bezukladnikov, Pasta Squasher

Beukladnikov, Pasta Smasher

Bezukladnikov, who was Boyarov's brother, took the usual route of climbing into the attic for boar chops. Bezukladnikov's cousin seemed really into attics, so Bezukladnikov felt a sense of kinship climbing up the ladder. By a crate Bezukladnikov also found a carton with three Sivet cigarettes (USSR Standard) and a thermos of tea he imagined belonged to someone who must be named Beard (as there was beard hair floating in it).

Quickly deducing the house was surrounded by zombies, Bezukladnikov dropped to the ground through the rotten floorboards nearest to the saw mill, with the stinging slap of feet on dirt. Bezukladnikov soles smarted as he sprinted up the hill, zigging back and forth serpentinely, like Bezukladnikov's cousin always tried to emulate. Bezukladnikov miraculously didn't get hurt by the torrent of bullets behind him, and grabbed the swag on top of the tractor. Bezukladnikov made the first sensible decision of his family line then, sprinting away from the saw mill like an eager schoolboy on the way to his first pasta stomping . . . competition . . .

It's a thing in Ukraine. Look it up.

Coming to a campfire beneath the pipe that connected to the building by the barn, Bezukladnikov was excited to finally be safe. Bezukladnikov saw a stalker sitting with his back to Bezukladnikov, and got greedy. Bezukladnikov plunged the dagger into his back – or tried to. Bezukladnikov stood like an idiot, futilely slashing at the resistant armor of the Dutyer before falling to a single shotgun blast. Like a little bitch.

Got tired of typing his name anyway.

The zone has claimed another one.


	6. Sayan the Modern Sailor

Sayan, Modern Sailor

Sayan, who was Bezukladnikov's step-brother, got straight to business swiping the tea, cigs, and boar chops. Through the heavy fog, he saw with almost unhuman senses a half-dozen abercrzombies shuffling about the driveway. He dropped to the ground with the graceful feet of an up-to-date seaman, sprinting through the gate, trusting the heavy fog to cloak him. He circled the base of the hill, coming up the far side to the barn. He clambered awkwardly up the tractor, like his first time on the recently-furnished ropes of a boat, to grab the loot atop it,

He sprinted blindly into the fog, falling down a hill and into the light of the campfire where three Duty stalkers idled. The two sitting ones refused to talk to him, citing his white sailor's cap and newfangled rope techniques, so he took a leap over the fire to impress him, earning some toasty thighs and some sack charring. This only proved his idiocy, so he winced over to the commander, Private Sedykh

Sayan asked about seeking paid work, cause he was all about making those cash moneyzz$z, and was pointed to Yanov, He asked about crashed helicopters, because they were like futuristic sealiners, but got only a blank stare. Faltering for conversation, he asked him what was new.

Private Sedykh said: "Making money costs money. You just calculate how much your 'investement' costs, and determine the risk and the return. What the hell did you think? This shit is all business and math. Nothing else to it. These sorry ass bitches walking around, looking like tough bastards, brandishing heavy weaponry, they are all mathematicians and businessmen. Some with PHDs and university diplomas. It's a hard place to live, and it's even a harder place to run a business. See, what I do is I calculate the price of the bullet, the price of repair and how much I have to spend if I wanna survive that specific 'adventure.' And if the return is big enough, I know what I'm doing next. Calculations like that you've got to make all the time. Do I shoot the boar that is chasing me, or keep my ammo for that raid on that bandit camp? Making money sure does cost money, sometimes more than you actually make. You make bad mistakes, you end up in the swamps. And that's all the philosophy there is to it."

Facinated by someone able to string together more than three sentences, Sayan asked him what his business was. He answered laughingly that what he really wanted is to relax at the Izumrudnoye resort.

Their idle chatter was interrupted by the stinging sensation of something biting Sayan's ankles. The stalkers opened fire, as Sayan heroically climbed atop a stack of crates. When the excitement ended, Sayan jumped down, frantic with adrenaline, and cut into the two dead psuedodogs with his soviet combat knife, collecting three chunks of dripping bloody meat (which went right into his lint-fileld pockets) and a fistful of hair.

Three unaffiliated stalkers arrived at the campfire, and after a brief exchange between commanders, took over the loitering spot as the Dutyers moved on with a wave goodbye. The leader, Alex Trump, didn't want to talk with the strange guy nursing a bleeding ankle. Sayan figured he had better things to do, important things, being the son of Alex Supertramp and Donald Trump.

Sayan took his cue to leave, feeling right at home as he set out across a marshy river to the metal-cover slope of a slanted roof to an exposed stage. It began to rain. A small collection of ruined houses faced the stage, and Sayan spotted a few dangerous looking boars running about. They did not look like the delicious chops sitting in his pocket. He waited for them to move away, and finally they did, far enough away for comfort but close enough for caution. Moving down off the slope, he heard a few gunshots coming from across the river where he came from, and spotted a slinking pseudodog nearby, but disregarded both to search the HAMLET (get it?).

He looked in the decapitated houses and beneath their slightly raised foundations, and eventually found some supplies under a desk in a room with a sweet painting of a happy upright lion on the wall outside. He found 350 mL of sparking water an open can (which he carefully sealed with a rock just large enough), another .5L of Stolichnaya vodka (which he gleefully squirreled away in the bloody meat pocket), two cigs (crumpled but still cancer-filled) and a chocolate protein bar (which he sniffed to make sure it wasn't poop). The last treasure was a sheaf of paper with writing scrawled across it. Being half-illiterate, and also in possible danger of boar mauling, he pocketed it for later. Continuing his search, he found a few more lion paintings (two young lions on turtles, a lion riding a bicycle, and a mischevious looking lion) and a crowbar and empty plastic jar under another house. Looking towards the stage, Sayan spotted a few wary-looking stalkers.

The stalkers popped a squat on the stage. Sayan approached, to be hailed by Private Sedykh. He brushed off any more conversation, saying that Sayan should get to business, and that 'Time is money, friend.' Sayan may have imagined the last word.

The rain escalated, punctuated by brilliant lightning arcs in the clouded morning skys, as Sayan walked the road away from the hamlet. Approaching a burnt village, Sayan looked down the hill to the right and saw a glorious sight (hey I rhymed) – a boat!

Sayan took off at a sprint down the hill towards his new home, almost falling into a treachourous-looking cavern. He came across three carcasses of fleshy-looking pig monsters, little more than orbs of flesh with spindly legs and squashed faces. They were badly decayed, but despite this he almost considered taking their meat until the rotting sickly-sweet smell reminded him too much of that time on the life raft with those guys who soon became those corpses that were smelly, oh so smelly. . .

Sayan suppressed the memory as he waded through the marshy mire to the beached boat. He passed by some stalkers moving out of the boat, saying "Early bird gets the worm, ey?" to them, with no reply other than cold and slightly confused looks. He entered through the heavy portal door, coming into a cozy room comfortably occupied by tables with chatting stalkers, some cleaning weapons or handling food. He was greeted by a bearded fellow across a bar with a "Welcome, Stalker!" He strolled across to the bar, swaying back in forth, pantomiming the movement of a ship at sea but coming across as just being drunk. The man introduced himself, saying "Ah, a new face! How pleasant among this ugly lot! My name is Beard." Sayan started, and took out the canister of tea, asking "Is this your tea?" Beard laughed, and pushed it back into Sayan's hands.

Sayan asked for work, and was told of a weird glow at the dredge station to the northeast. He gave a half-hearted attempt at quest acceptance, then moved on to a pleasant conversation about the kind of person who becomes a stalker, and what their motivations might be. Asking about trade, Beard showed him a comprehensive list of his wares, slipping in a strange backhand reference to a batch of 'magic' mushrooms he was growing, "cause you seem the type who likes to have a good, spacey time. Sayan didn't know what he meant, and didn't believe in magic ever since he learned at sea that there was no edge of the earth to make an endless waterfall off of, so he moved on to hawking some of his wares, acutely aware of his 100-ruble wallet. He sold two chunks of psuedodog meat, the fur, three of the five cigs, the broken radio (which he thought before was a camera that couldn't take selfies), the sparkling water, .5L of vodka, the welding goggles, and the empty plastic jar. He walked away from the deal with 4023 rubles in his wallet – his favorite number! He remembered to check the price for a universal power device for his hand-me-down PDA, but it cost 4462 rubles – he was 439 short!

He sipped the .25 L of vodka, savoring its bite, as he walked the boat and introduced himself. He met a shifty medic by the unfortunate name of Tremor, a terse merchant Owl, a mechanic named Cardan nursing a hangover that seemed much more massive than Sayan's own, and a friendly stalker named Nimble, who told him he could take the cot and storage box in an unused corner of the sleeping quarters. He sat down on his cot and took the time to attempt to parse the sheaf of papers he found. They seemed to be a log of drug deals with various names, locations, and goods sold. From it he learned that Freedom supplies most of the natural drugs like marijuana, with bandits supplying harder drugs like cocaine and salicylic acid. Apparently even Monolith traded in the stuff, offering expensive gear and ammo for large amounts of drugs. It made for an interesting read, but most of the drugs he had never heard of (he swore off drugs after trying to get fucked up off of the heated and fermented remains of cow feces) and the reading made his head hurt, so he tossed the log, plus the crowbar, hammer, tea, battery, protein bar, hunk of dog meat, battery, and two cigs into his storage box. He felt hungry, so he sat listening to the soothing waves of music coming out of the radio on the bar while munching on the boar chops, which were a bit stiff with age.

He introduced himself to some of the stalkers in the mess hall, and was waived over by a stalker in a trench coat sitting on a crate, attended by an armed and masked guard. He called himself Sultan, and seemed annoyed and a bit embarrassed when Sayan prostrated before him on his knees, praising him as the Sultan of the Seven Seas. He offered Sayan a job breaking up a stalker arms deal, to kill the stalkers and steal the goods. It seemed lucrative, but Lucrative was Sayan's middle name. Another stalker offered him a job securing a crate from a car at the bottom of a canyon, and a third spoke of some asshole named Magpie who was being a prick. He gave both his vague and easily retracted agreement to help. He also swiped a loaf of bread from the table when they weren't looking. You know, magnanimously.

He found a stalker named Grouse who told him about a few stalkers who had gone missing and showed up drained of blood. The story made Sayan queasy, and the queasiness made him feel guilty about the bandit raid, so he tattle-taled the details of the operation. Grouse told him to play along, but double cross the bandits with the help of the forewarned stalkers. This was his kind of job! Skirt along the sidelines, being able to call yourself part of the group, before waiting for the infighting to cease and swooping up the refuse. Like the dolphin: the vulture of the sea. He had some time to kill before dark, so he idled around the ship before setting out again into the wild yonder.


	7. Sayan pt 2

Before leaving, Sayan buys 30 slugs for the TOZ 66 for 948 RU, bringing him down to 3075. Gotta spend money to make money, right? He departed at 12:35, heading towards the basin of a hill where four fleshes frolicked. FFF. Upon noticing him, they feigned a series of charges, but did not commit to the engage. Three ran away, leaving one cornered by Sayan. He made quick work of the animal with his knife. He plucked out its eye for a keepsake, then attempted to track the other fleshes. He chased the one he found back around the basin, like a running back with the skills of a spastic Siamese twin with elephantitus. He eventually resorted to pounding it in the ass with a pellet slug, weakening it enough for him to deliver the killing blow with his knife. He chopped off another hunk of flesh and set off across the marsh.

Across the marsh, near the remains of another rusted boat was a flesh cavorting in the mud. Sayan crouched silently as the flesh was torn apart by gunfire. He located the gunmen – two stalkers who were then moving further away from him. From their Columbine-style trenchcoats, they must be bandits. Sayan decided to follow them, after slicing off some hide and two hunks of meat from the mutated pig.

Creeping through the reeds, Sayan narrowly spotted three stalkers moving towards him thirty meters ahead and to the right. He sat back in place, unsure of their allegiance. Stalking the stalkers parallel to their path, Sayan came across the dead remains of a few fleshes, boars, and even two Bloodsuckers. They were too badly decayed to have anything valuable, so Sayan kept shadowing the unkown stalkers.

The stalkers took out their guns and fired short, controlled bursts into a boar and a few dogs chasing each other around the hamlet. Sayan waited for them to begin moving on, then snuck behind them to salvage the carcasses. That's when he found it.

A large mass of flesh that must have weighed at least 500 pounds. The torso had what seemed to be a stretched and distorted face that may, perhaps, have been human at some point. A large set of arms seemed to be its form of locomotion, with a smaller almost vestigial set above it. The gangly lower part of its torso had a large right foot, and instead of a left one, a sticky tentacle. Sayan hacked off the pseudogiant's hand, already making up the story of his slaying of the beast.

The stalkers were taking up position in the hamlet, so Sayan moved on. He crossed down into the dried remains of a channel, under a cracked bridge, and came up to a road with a metal railing. From the bushes he heard a bark, as a blind dog came snarling after him. He let off two panicked shots, only hitting one, and hopped over the railing to avoid the dog's charge. This continued for a few repetitions until Sayan let off two more shots, the last hitting and killing the dog, but not before the dog bit him hard in the thigh. He cursed the thing as he ripped off a hunk of dog meat. The Koreans would pay well for it.

Wincing through the pain in his leg, Sayan continued onwards, fuelled by his thirst for adventure. He walked the undergrowth between a gas station on the left and a ditch on the right filled with a building-size mass of twisted roots. On the other side of the anomaly was a campfire with a human skeleton, complete with PDA and a cracked EO-20 PBF gas mask. He celebrated with a quick jerk into the ditch, then continued south. What he saw as he rose over a ridge sent a sliver of poop down his leg.

A hunched over figure on all fours stared at him quite plainly with four eyes split between its two heads. The Chimera leapt, and Sayan dove to the side with a girlish scream. He sprinted away further to the south, relying on adrenalin and sheer terror to guide him. He ran until his sides split with cramps, and only then did he look behind him to find he was safe, for the moment. As he rested against a tree, he found a multifuel stove, complete with three liters of kerosene. With that, he could live off the land. He was one step closer to self-sufficiency. After a brief rest, he moved east, trying to find another way back that would avoid the dangerous predator. He moved behind some kind of walled depot, finding a plastic jar and some busted ammo.

Despite his close run in with death, Sayan couldn't feel happier as he skipped along, shotgun in hand, dreaming of all the Martha Stewart-style home cooked meals he would prepare. The mountain lion almost took him by surprise. He barely had time to scramble up a rock and let out a desperate blast that grazed the beast. It retreated into the brush, but the noise of the shot attracted another predator. . .

On all fours bounded closer what seemed to be a disheveled man with a broken gas mask. He jumped frighteningly far towards Sayan, clawing him across the side. Sayan fell to the rock, bewildered, firing haphazardly into the dirt below him. He was unable to stop the snork's final lunge that disemboweled him and gave him an up close lesson on how snorks eat through their gas mask.

The zone has claimed another one.


	8. Aspidov the Wretched Cockroach

Aspidov the Wretched Cockroach

Aspidov, who was a cousin to Sayan before he was disowned for being a piece of scum, awoke in the cabin and crossed carefully over to the ladder. A zombie outside noticed him and fired a stream of inaccurate bullets. He scaled the ladder unharmed, but other zombies added their fire to the mix, not even knowing what they shot at. He grabbed the supplies, and planned his escape. Through the missing floorboards he saw a large crowd of zombie shambling over to the door, staring right up at him. He crossed over to the other side of the house and dropped down to the ground, landing hard on his heels. He heard gunfire behind him as he sprinted away, before circling around to grab the shotgun and other goods from the tractor in the bar. After that, he walked down to the hill to the campfire were a sole stalker sat. SSS. He stripped a radio sitting beside the stalker of the batteries and, when the stalker complained that he was listening to it, shot him in the face with a slug. Or, at least, he was going to until he noticed the man's comrade in the shadows nearby. He was trying to line up a shot that would take out both men at once when the third stalker arrived. He then decided it was best to just follow them and wait for them to let their guard down or die. Yeah, he was kind of a dick. Hence his highschool nickname, Wretch. The cockroach part came later.

As he walked behind the three stalkers, another trio passed them by. Their leader called out "What's up, bro?" Aspidov stopped in his tracks. No one had ever acknowledged him as a brother, not even his brother. To be greeted in such a friendly way by a stranger. . . Suddenly, Aspidov felt extremely guilty for plotting to murder an innocent just for his gun and loot. Introducing himself to the trio's leader, Grishko Whiskey, Aspidov decided to stop being such a piece of shit and learn the art of Not Being A Dick by traveling with Grishko. Grishko and one of his friends took up seats at the campfire, while the third traveled further down the road, approaching a deep swamp that was filled with acidic anomalies. Watching the green mist reflect the light of the lightning above, Aspidov was startled to see a man on all fours bounding straight towards him. Then, another right behind the first. He shouted out a word of warning and retreated behind the fire, courageously letting Grishko do all the combat for him. After the two snorks were dead, he ripped off one of their legs, to the strange looks of his new fellows. He didn't take any more parts because he didn't want them to think he was weird.

He soon got bored of sitting in the rain by the campfire, so he walked up the hill back to the saw mill in hope of picking off a few zombies. He lurked behind the barn, watching some zombies wander around the top of the hill, before a zombie around the corner spotted him. He waited until the zombie came around the corner, luring it around a pile of logs before flanking it around the other side and laying into it with his knife. He took a bullet graze to the shoulder for his troubles, but snatched up an engineering manual (he preferred the spy or the heavy anyway), a neglected Fort 12 and 15 bullets for it. Eager to show his new friends, he ran back down the hill to find them leaving. He fell into step behind them, trying to ignore the sinking feeling that they were trying to ditch him. Just like his brother.

The first of the sun's rays were just piercing the horizon when the stalkers pulled out their weapons. Aspidov looked into the brush and spotted a pack of fleshes, which the stalkers opened fire on. Keenly aware of his lack of ammunition and, feeling a little Jewish, he pulled out his knife and charged two of the beasts. One, already weakened by gunfire, went down easily. The other Aspidov dodged, dancing around the beast as he stabbed it. This time the stalkers looked on with approval as he skinned the beasts, distributing their bounty and keeping two hunks of meat, an eye, and a hide to himself. Aspidov took more caution to perceive his surroundings as the group moved across a marshy river. He saw a snork on the shore taking down the escaping survivor of the herd. He let the stalkers take down the snork, rushing over to cut a hunk of meat from the flesh and the snork's two hands. This time, he got some weird looks, as he made the hands clap together in congratulations of their new friendship.

As the group crossed the river, Aspidov heard gunfire coming from the saw mill. Taking the opportunity, he rushed back. As he grew closer he could distinguish intelligent shouts – too articulate for zombies. Sure enough, in the covered part of the saw mill at the top of the hill he saw a stalker in an exoskeleton firing down the hill into the courtyard. Between Aspidov and the stalker was an unnoticed zombie, taking rough aim at the stalker. Aspidov quickly lay down the zombie with his knife, more out of greed than consideration, looting a worn Walther P99 with 15 bullets and 100 roubles. Moving past the fence under the work roof by the barn, Aspidov saw several other stalkers in combat with the zombies. One zombie was struggling on the ground, and when he began to rise Aspidov killed him with three bullets from his Fort 12. There were three other dead zombies that Aspidov quickly stripped of anything valuable he could find. Right in front of him, one of the stalkers was taken down by a bullet to the face. Instead of checking for a pulse, Aspidov took his gun and searched his pockets, hoping the others wouldn't notice. He moved towards the barn, taking down another grounded zombie with two shots. He saw another zombie on the other side of the barn, and moved into it to flank the dead stalker. As he came to the doorway on the other side, the zombie stepped through it, gun raised. They traded fire, and both landed fatal shots.

The zone has claimed another one.


	9. Abramovich, the Step-Daughter

Abramovich the Step-Daughter

Abramovich, the adopted child of Aspidov's parents who through a tragic mistake at birth was assumed to be a woman, came to in the cabin. The first thing he did was check to make sure his penis was still intact – he had an irrational fear of losing it that came from a childhood of being mislabeled as a girl. Peeking over the side of the roof after grabbing the attic supplies, Abramovich took cover as a few zombies spotted him and shot upward. He dropped to the ground through the missing boards, which hurt almost as much as the buckshot that tore into his lower back. He did his best to plug the wound as he ran to the barn and the shotgun within. It was with great relief that he came across the campfire. The three stalkers there helped him pick out the buckshot, although they didn't even offer him a bandage, before they moved on. He grabbed a battery from the busted radio at his feet, and followed them.

Hearing gunfire from the river, Abramovich rushed towards it, seeing the bullets of several stalkers rippling the water. He was just in time to witness the second of two boards being killed, with only the chance to loot one of them. He ripped off a chop of boar meat and got ready to make his excuses as to why it was okay for him to do so. Before he could introduce himself, the dog barking gave him barely any warning to the two blind dogs racing straight towards him. They took a fat bite out of his leg before being taken down by the stalkers. He cursed and again had to plug his bleeding wound as he took a chunk of dog meat and left the rest for the others. Feeling like he lost enough blood for the night, he decided to try and find a safe place to rest. He walked up to the resort hamlet, but the houses were too dilapidated to provide safe shelter. He did find the supplies there though.

Abramovich heard gunfire coming from beyond the hamlet and, against his better instincts, moved to investigate. He found a large herd of six to seven fleshes that he was soon surrounded by. Screaming in fear, he sprinted away from the chasing herd towards the gunfire and the stalkers that made it. They were shooting in the other direction from him, and he had only a moment to wonder what they fired at before they turned and fired at him instead. He took a few bullets to the chest and ran behind a rock, holding his blood-soaked sleeve to his wounds for the third time in an hour. The last thing he heard was the clink of a grenade pin being pulled and the soft plop of said grenade falling into the water beside him.

The zone has claimed another one.


	10. Sechenov the Train Whisperer

Sechenov the Train Whisperer

Sechenov, who was estranged for his delusional relationship with trains, didn't get far. He dropped from the attic and took off at a dead run, but even one who has spent many days and nights traveling, racing, conversing, and even loving trains could not outrun a bullet. Or the five that dug straight into his spine.

The zone has claimed another one.


	11. Venediktov, Woman Flasher

Venediktov, Woman Flasher

Venediktov, who was the uncle of Sechenov, waited until he saw a large group of zombies moving one direction away from the cabin. He dropped to the ground and sprinted the other direction. However, he was spotted and took several gunshots before escaping. He bled out under a tree, thinking of all the women he would never get to flash.

Fuck, I'm not getting very far tonight.

The zone has claimed another one.


	12. Pushkin the Tiresome Composer

Pushkin the Tiresome Composer

Pushkin, who was the son of Venediktov, awoke with dread to the fated cabin. He knew his last two relatives had died not far from the cabin, and was determined to break the trend. He spent a long while watching the zombies' movements, waiting for the perfect opportunity to escape. As he bided his time, he heard gunshots in the distance. He hoped they would come closer and distract the zombies, but he had no such luck. The zombies began to crowd in the cabin below him. He checked over the side and was relieved to find there were no zombies within sight. He seized the chance, dropped down, and sprinted away unharmed. Huzzah! His father and cousin would be proud, and a little jealous. He retrieved the shotgun and supplies from the barn, and proceeded onward.

Pushkin arrived at the campfire just at the same time as another group of stalkers. He considered writing a song for them, but it seemed too troublesome. So instead he stole their radio battery, so none other may burden their ears with music. Further down the road, he saw the telltale muzzle flashes of gunfire, but didn't find what the stalkers were shooting at when he investigated. He decided to follow that group of stalkers, led by Vadim Chebur, because like them he was a man of action.

Together, they waded across a river. Pushkin saw the occasional flesh or boar on the horizon, but the group did not engage them, so he didn't either. Upon reaching the opposite shore, a boar came too close and got a full helping of lead sandwhich with extra being dead. Pushkin skinned the boar of its pelt. He saw the stalkers were heading towards the resort hamlet, so he ran ahead to loot the two stashes. As he pushed through a bush, he almost shit his pants when he came face to face with a flesh. It ran from him, and he gleefully gave chase, composing a song as he caught up with the beast and slashed it with his knife. He grew bored of the song before he killed the flesh, and then carved off a chunk of meat. He saw another flesh, which he chased, but it ran towards a dangerously exposed area with overturned umbrellas and lawn chairs. The stalkers arrived, then, and took place on the stage by a roasted boar. He cut off two boar chops and sat with the stalkers. He began to hum a song, but just as the stalkers started getting into it, the humming gave him a headache so he stopped.

Pushkin grew bored, and wandered back to the area with the lawn chairs. He saw the corpse of a flesh, but when he walked down the hill to salvage it, he saw another flesh being attacked by a humanoid monster with tentacles covering its mouth that appeared out of thin air. He ran back to the stalkers like a scared little bitch. Partly because he was scared, and a little bit of a bitch. As daylight rose, he ventured out once again, chasing two fleshes, but the bloodsucker appeared again so he Noped all the way back to the resort.

Resting with Vadim, Pushkin realized it was time he fledged the nest. He traveled north, away from the bloodsucker, and found a large herd of at least six fleshes. He attempted to hunt them, at times chasing them and at times dodging their charges, but for all his efforts his blade only hit home once. He came across four dead fleshes, however, which netted him two chunks of meat from the ones not badly decayed.

As he approached Skadovsk, a trio of stalkers began to fire at the flesh herd. He waited paintently on the sidelines, eager for one to make a mistake. Sure enough, one stalker was isolated and brought down by a few fleshes. He ran over to the stalker, taking his assault rifle (a black AK-105, empty), a Fort-12 (with an astounding 32 shots), 100 roubles, and a picture of a woman (a bit chunky but not hard on the eyes). One of the fleshes had been killed, so he grabbed another hunk of meat before retreating back to the ship. He heard the barking of dogs as another stalker was mobbed and taken down. He waited for the gunfire to stop before approaching the corpse, looting a Colt M1911 (8 shots, with a silencer), a set of military maps, and 2 synthetic ropes. He almost went inside the ship, but looked back and was astonished to find yet another dead stalker. Unlike the others, he seemed poorly equipped, and only had a corroded USP Compact (which used the same kind of bullet as the Fort-12, but with worse performance).

Pushkin reclined on a seat atop Skadovsk, looking over his gear with joy. Examining the Fort-12, he discovered it had been customized by its previous owner, with increased reliability and decreased weight. There was no doubt about it – it was his lucky day. He had escaped the zombies without a scratch, taken some opportunistic meat, avoided an encounter with a dangerous bloodsucker, and stumbled across a bounty that would help keep him alive. Hoping to take advantage of hit hot streak while his luck still held out, he decided to go back to the saw mill and kill the zombies, after selling some of his stuff. He looked back before climbing through the portal into Skadovsk, to see a wonderous sight – the herd of fleshes had taken down another stalker! He ran towards the crime scene, and was amused to see a bloodsucker on the run from the flesh herd. They ran back around to the corpse's vicinity, so Pushkin lost his nerve and returned to the ship, remembering the corpse's location.

He watched the fleshes and bloodsucker fight from the safety of the ship's ramparts. The fleshes eventually panicked and fled from the bloodsucker, away from the corpse. Deciding to take the risk, he sprinted to the body, taking its loot. He saw the corpses of a flesh and two dogs, but didn't feel comfortable taking the time to skin them. On his way back, he found another two dead stalkers. He started to become nervous, even paranoid. What was killing so many stalkers so close to safety? Was there a disease? Or an assassin? Who would be next?

Pushkin ran, terrified to look behind him, back to the ship after looting the bodies. He went inside the safety of the hull before looking over his find. There was a modern SKS-45 semi-auto rifle (customized for bullet trajectory flatness, reliability, and decreased weight, with 3 shots), a worn MP5A3 submachine gun (15 shots), a Beretta p2F pistol (also customized for decreased recoil, increased fire rate, a silencer, and an automatic firing mode) which had 15 shots of the same type of bullet as the MP5, a dog tail, a worn Makarov PM pistol (with 8 shots of the same caliber as the superior Fort-12, which he unloaded from the magazine), a telescopic mirror (used for seeing around corners), 100 roubles, a textile sheet, a broken flashlight, a dead Geiger counter, and two RGD-5 grenades. He could hardly suppress his grin as he met with Beard to sell his goods.

He sold the Makarov and USP, because they used the same caliber as the Colt M1911 and Fort-12 respectively but with poorer performance. In addition, he sold all his vodka, the broken radio and Geiger counter, the dog tail, three chunks of flesh meat (all but one), the welding goggles, the plastic jar, all but one of the cigs, the drug distribution notes (which he thumbed through first), the mirror, the military battery, the broken flashlight, and the boar pelt. He gave himself a congratulatory wank in the bathroom to the woman's picture, and then sold that too. He walked away from the deal with a cool 7579 roubles.

He knew he had to spend some money to make some money, so he started with buying a universal power device for his PDA so he could navigate, which cost a crippling 4462 roubles. He was good on food, so he moved on to the merchant Owl to buy some ammo for his newly acquired guns. He bought 30 5.45x39mm rounds for the AKM (a full clip), 10 more 12x70 buckshot rounds for the TOZ 66 sawn-off, and 30 9x18mm rounds for the Fort-12. He felt the damage to his wallet keenly, walking away with a scant 1559 roubles. Resigned, he talked to the medic Tremor and spent 1568 roubles on two bandages, which thought was ridiculous. He was a bit short of the price, so he sold his can of sparkling water. At the end of his trading, he was depressed to count only 237 roubles.

He secured a storage box and a cot to sleep on, and stored all but the protein bar (which he ate, feeling hungry), one grenade, the AKM, the sawn-off, the Fort-12, the ammo for said weapons, his trusty knife, and the two bandages. He felt confident of his success as he ventured out, into the newly-arrived rainstorm, to hunt down the zombies that had long plagued his family line.

He avoided any fleshes and other mutants he came across as he jogged to the saw mill, wanting to save his luck for the fight ahead, as if it was a tangible resource (which he believed it was after the days' events). He approached the hill where the saw mill proper sat with caution, peering over the ridge to see several zombies MILLING about (get it?) among the log piles. He crossed over to the barn, in order to secure its cover, careful to avoid the attention of the zombies outside it. He crept through the same back door he had previously exited through, and snuck up on a zombie. Just as he brought down the zombie with his knife, a boar inexplicably ran inside. He dodged to the side and ran back out the door, without even looting the zombie, to avoid the deadly beast. He carefully took a peek inside the door, thumbing his AKM to single-fire mode. Seeing another zombie shambling towards him, he downed it with one satisfying shot. He didn't find the boar inside, so he quickly looted the two bodies and also found a previously unnoticed bag of charcoal. Moving back outside the barn, he heard voices that didn't belong to a zombie.

Pushkin heard suppressed gunfire and the groans of zombies coming from the other side of the barn, followed by return fire. He stayed behind the barn, waiting for the two sides to kill each other. As he crept around the side of the barn, he was surprised to perceive the gunfire coming from outside the saw mill in the forest. He saw a dead stalker, and a few other live ones, as well as a military-uniformed man they seemed to be fighting. Worried about getting caught in the crossfire, he retreated back behind the barn. He regretted not investing in binoculars as he struggled to watch the fight through the foliage.

One stalker came dangerously close, so Pushkin ducked behind the corner, unsure of their friendliness. He came around the corner as well and barely acknowledged Pushkin, to his relief. They seemed intent on fighting the zombies, and whatever else their previous target had been. Pushkin was more than happy to let them fight for him. He followed the stalker into the barn with the goal not so much to assist him as to wait for him to die. He laid down another zombie a few dozen meters away with a precise headshot. Hey, he was good at this! He fired another four shots at an approaching zombie, but only winged it once. Maybe not so much. He took cover, and saw the other stalker get killed by the opposite doorway. He swung out his shotgun as the zombies approached the barn. As the one he had fired at entered, Pushkin backed out through the back door again, using its cover to lay down the zombie with eight shots of his Fort-12. He looted the dead stalker and the zombie while he had the chance, noticing the second zombie had wandered out. Outside, he saw the band of stalkers being set upon by a pack of dogs. Now, he actually hoped they would survive, so he would have a chance to loot their dead. There was no way he could take on a pack of dogs alone, blind they may be.

One of the stalkers escaped to the saw mill and took down the zombie who had left the building, giving Pushkin the chance to take its stuff. Pushkin formed up on the stalkers right flank, taking down another zombie with a single-bullet headshot via AKM. The hill was largely cleared of zombies, but the driveway below with the infamous cabin was still teeming with zombies. He saw a stalker in a trenchcoat get blown away point blank by a shotgun-toting zombie, which the other stalker then killed. Pushkin killed a zombie climbing the hill with two more shots. A grenade blast went off near a few zombies by the cabin, and they seemed to retreat behind it. There was a handful of corpses in the driveway, but Pushkin decided to wait until more of the zombies were cleared out.

Returning his eyes to the forest where the stalkers came from, he was happy to see that they had killed off the dog pack. He moved amongst the dead men and beasts, taking what he could, before following two stalkers back to the saw mill. Taking cover behind the building with pipes coming out of it, he found another dead stalker, which he liberated of goods. He was tempted to call it a day, pockets brimming with loot, but resolved himself to finish his task of eradicating the zombies. The remaining zombies had retreated behind the cabin, so he moved down the hill to collect from the dead. He came around to the side of the cabin, but heard some dogs coming from that direction, so he turned and went the other way around.

Maneuvering for a better position, Pushkin just came around the back of the cabin as an eery silence descended on the saw mill. The zombies were all dead! Immediately, a sense of elation filled Pushkin. For generations his family had been trapped by the hordes around the cabin. Tales of the dreaded Zombie Cabin of Zaton were told to children in his family to keep them on the straight and narrow. Too many ancestors and relatives had died to their dumb, inaccurate, but massed fire, and now Pushkin had finally gotten revenge. He made a final round to loot any bodies he missed, and entered the cabin one last time to say good riddance.

Pushkin didn't want to stick around to chat with the stalkers, who were celebrating their victory as well as mourning their dead. He felt guilty for taking the best loot and pilfering the bodies of their comrades, so he wanted to just leave. As the adrenalin faded, he found he was so burdened by his loot that it was difficult to walk, much less run. What a wonderful problem to have! He considered leaving a stash, but got greedy and wanted to take it all to Skadovsk. He knew he would have to be extra cautious, being unable to make a quick escape from danger. Moving across a bridge towards the ship, he heard a dog bark and saw it darting amongst the bushes, so he altered his path and crested the hill under the elevated pipeline that pointed in Skadovsk's general direction. He took his time returning to the ship, avoiding the groups of fleshes and dogs he spotted from the hilltop. Needless to say, it was with great relief that he entered the mess hall.

Pushkin rested over a meal of boar chops on hit cot. It was tough and lean meat, but he had never tasted a better meal. The events of the day enhanced the flavor more than any master chef ever could. After he was done with his meal, he went through all the swag he got. Seperating the gear he already carried from his loot, Pushkin did a full inventory.

He had found: an RPK-74 light machinegun (which, at 5.59 kg, was hardly light), a Dragunov SVD sniper rifle (with an astonishing 70 shots), a camouflaged AKS-74U (an AK model similar to a submachine gun), three worn TOZ-66 sawn-off shotguns, and another badly corroded one, a worn PPSh-41 submachine gun that looked like it came right out of the mafia days, a gas canister so large he was surprised he ever fit it in his pack, four rusty SIG P220 pistols, some "Dvojka" brand gun oil and cleaning solvent (enough for two uses), a worn Desert Eagle (which he posed with for a while, feeling badass), another corroded USP compact, two Browning Hi-Power pistols, well-worn, a Walther P99 alternate model that fitted with a silencer, also present, two worn Fort-12's, not customized, a customized Makarov PM with increased mag size and decreased weight and recoil as well as a silencer, a regular worn Makarov PM, a Colt M1911 with a silencer in decent condition, a walkie talkie (which he practiced saying "roger, roger, copy that, ten-four" with), a camouflage tarpaulin sheet, the skin of a Burer dwarf (why the hell did they have that?), a hunk of dog meat, a chop of boar meat, two hunks of flehs meat, three dog tails, 900 roubles, some broken ammo, a deck of playing cards, some old batteries, three first-aid kits (an amazing find!), a VOG-25 grenade (made to be launched by a grenade launcher attached to a rifle), a small survival kit (with rations, radiation meds, and some medical supplies, a Masculine Meal (a chunk of grilled Chimera meat with mushrooms and spices: the equivalent of a five-star meal in the Zone), one military stimpack and two improvsed ones (which would heal him quickly but consume much of his calories), and assortment of ammo, and finally three powerful F1 grenades, much stronger than the RGD-5's. His final find was an Echo artifact detector, which pinged with intervals proportional to the distance to a nearby artifact. Once he got a good suit, he could start artifact hunting.

He took a moment to go over the fight in his mind. For the cost of nine AKM shots and about a clip of Fort-12 bullets, he had accumulated a frightening arsenal! He stored all the food, the grenades, the light machine gun, sniper rifle, and AKS-74u, several of the better pistols, all but one stimpack, and the sheet. The rest, an assortment of shitty pistols, shotguns, and a submachine gun, as well as the meat and mutant parts, as well as walkie talkie, bad ammo, and playing cards, he sold to Beard (Owl wouldn't accept such low quality guns) for a profit of 4675 roubles, bringing him up to 4912 roubles. He had made a profit on the expedition, but just barely. But better than the money was the supplies he got – guns, ammo, food and medicine that would give him the breathing space to avoid living hand-to-mouth for a while. Checking his PDA, he was surprised to find it was only 6:00 pm. The day had passed by quickly, and left him exhausted. He chatted with some of the stalkers, accepting their missions, deciding to not tell the stalkers of the bandit raid for the time being. He also swiped a loaf of bread – cause old, kleptomaniac habits die hard. He had six hours until the bandit raid to make his decision, so he retired to his cot for a few well-deserved hours of shut-eye. He was astonished to feel a degree of joy at the day's work, but he knew with a grim realization that his luck could not last.


End file.
